


What Must Be

by dezolis



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: F/M, Prophecy, Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-01-26
Updated: 2013-04-01
Packaged: 2017-11-26 22:21:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/655018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dezolis/pseuds/dezolis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cersei just wanted to forget Maggy the Frog's prophecy, but every step she takes seems to bring her closer to fulfilling it.  Is she fighting fate or ensuring that it comes to be?  Rating and warning are for future chapters.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Death

_“Worms will have your maidenhead. Your death is here tonight, little one. Can you smell her breath? She is very close.”_

“You don’t believe her, do you?” Melara asked. Cersei had lost count of how many times that made. She’d given up trying to answer so Melara did that for her by using the same doubts she’d been expressing with every step that took them away from the witch’s tent. “She was angry with us for waking her and told us all those horrible things to get back at us. They were cruel lies, nothing more.”

“Then why are you still prattling about them?” Cersei finally snapped at her friend. Melara stilled her tongue but Cersei’s temper continued to simmer. For all their volume, Melara’s words had not been able to drown out the ones uttered by that foul crone. Cersei had called them the nonsense that they were to the witch’s face while they were still in her tent - which only made Melara’s whining that much more useless and cloying - but their echoes were hard to silence. Her so-called prophecies didn’t even make sense. Oh, it would be sweet to marry Rhaegar after he’d already assumed the Iron Throne so he could give her a crown along with his cloak but the rest had been the most foolish of lies. He would have three-and-ten more children than she? He would allow another to supplant her? Jaime would allow such a thing? Lord Tywin? That witch would have done well to hear a singing of the Rains of Castamere before pulling her trick. She might have been able to craft a lie that was plausible to someone other than a fool.

And yet Cersei had been fool enough to seek the witch out, to slip from her bed in the dead of night and risk her father’s anger. It was Melara fault, truly. She’d been the one to come to come to her and Jeyne Farman, with awe and excitement in her voice as she’d recounted the tales she’d heard from the servicewomen. She’d been the one who insisted that the girls should go see her. All Cersei had done was decide that they would go at night. Lord Tywin would keep a tight eye on her during the day and he certainly wouldn’t have approved of his daughter seeking out some foreign witch.

Cersei’s temper flared full into cursing when she tripped across a rock and fell to the ground. Melara was by her side immediately offering to help her up. Cersei slapped her hand away. “I can stand on my own!”

“We should have brought a torch with us. It’s so hard to see now.”

“I told you, if we had brought a torch, then we might have been spotted and my father’s men would have taken us back.” This argument had seemed so obvious to Cersei before but even as she repeated it to Melara, she couldn’t help but wish she hadn’t thought of it to begin with. If they had been spotted, they could have avoided wasting their time with the crone. If they hadn’t, they’d at least have some damned light to find their way back to the castle.

They began walking once more towards the dark looming shape of Casterly Rock. They picked their steps carefully but even that became difficult when clouds overtook the moon and dimmed their lone source of light. Loose rocks and twigs seemed to gather at their feet while the grass grew slick from the night’s mists.

Melara came to a stop with a whimper. “We’re lost.” Such desperation was strange from her, a girl who dared as much if not more than Cersei. The witch’s words had dimmed her spirit. It fell to Cersei to lead them.

“We are not. These are the tourney grounds. The Rock is ahead of us.”

“These don’t look like the tourney grounds. Shouldn’t there be other tents about?”

There was some truth to that, Cersei had to admit. Though they’d started at the tourney grounds, they’d wandered good and long before finally finding the witch’s tent. The terrain didn’t feel right either. Lord Tywin would never host a tourney on anything but the most immaculate of fields. The debris that had vexed her and Melara could prove far more dangerous to a horse running at speed and her father simply would not have his tournament marred by accidents caused by carelessness. 

Fear, though, was for other girls, not a young lioness like herself. She wouldn’t lose her nerve as Melara had. Cersei wasn’t exactly sure where they were, but she’d only find the right path by continuing on, dragging Melara with her if needs be. “No one wanted to have their tent next to that smelly, old witch, that’s all,” she said. “She probably went around telling everyone their horses would fall and their lances would break and there was poison in the wine so they moved as far away as they could.”

Melara gave a small, nervous laugh at that so Cersei took it as a sign to forge forward, both in walking and with her japes. It did not work. Melara remained where she stood even as Cersei began imitating the crone by making her own wild prophecies in the scratchiest voice she could muster.

“And on the final tilt, a hoard of grumkins and snarks will swarm the field and the earth will shake and the Rock will fall and everybody will die -”

“You shouldn’t mock her.”

Cersei barely heard what Melara said but that didn’t matter. “Don’t interrupt me. And don’t tell me what to do. Mockery is all that witch deserves.”

“We should just forget about her.”

“Finally you say something wise.”

Melara nodded. “We won’t even speak of her. If we never talk about it we’ll soon forget, and then it will be just a bad dream we had. Bad dreams never come true.”

It would be a blessing to forget this night. It would also be a blessing to be back in her own bed, snug under the covers and dreaming only sweet dreams of her soon to be made betrothal to Rhaegar. What power could the witch’s words hold then?

“That is very clever,” Cersei said. “There’s nothing to fear in what’s lost and forgotten.”

“Yes, that’s it! We never even saw a witch. We just went for a walk tonight and told each other silly stories.”

“So silly, that come the morrow, they won’t be worth a reconsidering.”

With that agreed, they began walking anew. Both girls made certain to keep speaking of anything other than the witch. They talked of the feast to be held at tourney’s end and of the knights competing. They gossiped over the favors the ladies would give and imagined awarding their own. Girlish giggling seemed to chase off their earlier fears and they grew so bold as to place wagers on who would win. Melara was certain Arthur Dayne would take the final tilt while Cersei argued that Rhaegar could be the only victor. Cersei let herself be swept away in fancies of her prince winning the tourney and placing the crown for the Queen of Love and Beauty in her lap, fancies that were dashed when Melara began cooing hers.

“When Jaime’s of an age to ride, he’ll win all the tournaments,” Melara declared. “I’ll make favors for him and when he wins…”

“You think he will name you his Queen of Love and Beauty?” Cersei couldn’t decide if Melara’s delusions were more humorous than they were irritating.

“He could.”

“He would have to know who you are first.”

“I’m your friend, Cersei. Surely you could introduce us.”

“Jaime will be a knight, the Lord of Casterly Rock and the Warden of the West and I am to introduce you as what?”

“Your friend,” Melara repeated curtly, her old boldness fully returned.

“My friend, but not worthy of a great lord. Surely you can see that.”

Melara didn’t care to see. She brushed past Cersei with a huff.

“Don’t dismiss me!” But Melara did just that, her pace quickening and taking her into the dark.

Cersei shouted after her to stop and while she hated having to follow anyone, she had little choice but to run after her because Melara simply wouldn’t listen. When she came close, she grabbed after Melara’s arm but the other girl slid out of her grasp. 

So Cersei pushed instead.

Barely, she pushed. She only meant to make Melara listen. She only meant to let her know she would not be ignored. A small shove and the darkness opened up and swallowed Melara before Cersei could realize what had happened.

She heard the screaming first, then the thrashing of water echoed up from the ground. An open well. Melara had fallen into an open well. _Pushed. Shoved. Thrown._ the wind whispered in the crone’s voice.

“Cersei, help me!”

Help her? How? Cersei was a girl of ten. How could she lift another girl from a well?

“Cersei, please! The water’s cold! I can’t hold on!”

Of their own will, Cersei’s feet shambled to the well. It was too dark to see down into the well’s depths but it all came to her so clearly. Melara clinging to the small ledge of a jutting rock in the well wall. Her roughspun cloak drinking up the water and weighing her down. 

“Cersei! Cersei! Are you there?”

Her name must have been called half-a-hundred times but Cersei gave no response to any of them. It was only after the screaming turned to sobbing that her voice returned.

“Oh, gods,” Melara keened. “It’s just as the witch said….she was right, she was right…”

“We’re not to speak of the witch.”

“Cersei?”

Melara’s final call of her name was no demand, but the most piteous of pleas. For a moment it moved Cersei to crouch by the well’s rim and extend a hand over the emptiness. _There’s nothing to be done._ That was the truth of it, she was sure. She could not reach Melara. She sounded close but that must be the echoes from the well playing tricks. It must. She did not have the strength to pull her up regardless. Cersei was tired from all the walking they'd done and Melara would be so heavy from the water in her clothes. Certainly Melara was weak as well. She'd be of no help. An attempt to save her was more than like to cause Cersei to fall in after her. Is that what Melara wanted? For them to die together? She would not live her life beside Jaime so she wanted her death beside Cersei?

 _No, there’s nothing to be done._ Cersei told herself this until it was true, until the only noise coming from the well was a gentle lapping of water. Kneeling still, Cersei listened and listened and when the clouds set free the moon, she rose and let the light guide her back to the Rock.


	2. King

_“Never. You will wed the king.”_

“You will wed King Robert,” Lord Tywin announced. These were the first words he said to her after Cersei’s arrival in King’s Landing. She’d barely gotten through the gate when Lannister men had greeted her and hurriedly escorted her to the quarters Tywin had claimed for himself in the Red Keep. In truth, Cersei did not mind the rush. Only two moons had passed since the Sack of King’s Landing and the city still bore the signs of what had been done. Mostly it was in the buildings that had not yet been repaired but there were other clues. Though her party passed through the streets unmolested, the Lannister crimson and gold left sidelong glances and bitter whispers in its wake.

There was none of that here in Lord Tywin’s presence, only his glorious news. Cersei accepted it in the manner she thought her father would approve. She gave a pleased smile and a nod. Anything more would be indecorous. Over her father’s shoulder, she saw her twin Jaime lingering in the corner, his mien decidedly less measured. There was no hint of pleasure, feigned or otherwise about him. His lips were pulled into a distinct frown. She’d not seen Jaime since well before the Rebellion, the longest she’d been apart from him since birth. Yet as Jaime glowered from his corner, Cersei’s thoughts turned to another man and the last promise of marriage her father had made.

She had dreamt for so long of her father’s promise that she would marry Prince Rhaegar, it felt queer to know that dream was gone and the person who had forever taken it from her would be her new reality. This time, though, it _was_ reality. It could not be taken from her. Nor could she ever deny it.

Lord Tywin would never hear of such a thing. Without pause, he explained to Cersei that she was to meet her betrothed later when Tywin would present her formally to Robert in the throne room. He also told her what she was to wear and what she was to say. That was the entirety of their reunion. As soon as he was finished, he was motioning for her ladies in waiting to begin attending to her.

“Please, Father,” Jaime said a breath before Cersei could say the words herself. “May I have a moment with my sweet sister before you have her trussed and dressed like a prized goose?”

His distaste for Jaime’s tone was evident, but their father acquiesced. His plans to endear himself to the Baratheon cause had worked and now he was forming new ones to capitalize further. Lord Tywin was always happiest when plotting. He could generous and let his golden twins have their moments before he had his.

Once he was gone, Jaime made sure everyone else in the room followed. A few of her ladies questioned being parted from their mistress but Cersei shooed them off to find and prepare the rooms that would be hers during what was to become a permanent stay at King’s Landing.

Cersei hadn’t even shut the door fully when Jaime came up behind her and wrapped his arms about her waist. They’d shared a height as children but now Jaime stood tall enough that he could rest his head atop hers. Normally, it would have been a playful gesture. Their new circumstances would never be deemed such. Jaime held onto her as if he would fall without her.

They should be more cautious. Everyone knew the walls of the Red Keep had ears. Eyes too, since the eunuch Varys had been brought here. Cersei knew the Master of Whispers had bought a pardon with promises of great loyalty and service. Informing the king of his betrothed’s odd closeness with her twin brother would be one way to put strong proof to those promises. But this was Jaime, the other half of her soul. She would not deny him.

Cersei brought on of his hands to her lips. She’d kissed him many times before. Their games, they had called it, all the kisses and touches they’d shared. And that was how it had started. She’d spent a day going about the Rock in Jaime’s clothes and name and had seen her world shift and change simply by becoming m’lord instead of m’lady. She had wondered, as she handed Jaime back his breeches, what could be so special about a cock that it could accord such privileges. Jaime hadn’t had an answer and when she’d tried to tease one out of him, it had led to a far different discovery then they’d imagined.

They’d had such innocence then. Perhaps they had some still, Cersei thought, as she kissed each finger and Jaime pressed her closer, if they could find comfort in a stolen moment like this. Perhaps not, she thought again, when Jaime spoke.

“A prized goose. That’s all you’ll be to him. He’ll have his share then move on to whomever else catches his fancy.”

His voice was bitter. _Jealousy_ , Cersei thought and part of her was thrilled at this evidence of her twin’s love. That part of her could never be allowed to speak in these close quarters. She turned to face Jaime, to stare at the face so like hers but for a broader jaw and the short growth of golden hair along it.

She cared not for this fledging beard. Jaime looked his handsomest clean shaven. She touched it, lightly, and Jaime instantly knew her thoughts. “I’ve had other concerns,” he said.

Cersei had heard them. No doubt they were speaking of the Kingslayer all the way to the Wall. Fortunately, Jaime would not be joining those ruffians. He’d earned a pardon and the right to keep his position. “Yes,” Cersei replied simply, “Guarding the new king.” Lord Tywin was likely displeased by his son’s continued wearing of a white cloak, but for Cersei, Jaime’s presence on the Kingsguard was a guarantee that they would not be separated again.

“And soon you’ll have a queen to watch closely over,” she purred.

Cersei expected this to soothe his rankled temper. It only made it worse. “You know the sort of man Robert Baratheon is. He won’t honor his vows. He won’t honor you.”

Cersei did know. Robert’s appetites were such that they’d been inescapable at tourneys. He’d drunk the most, laughed and boasted the loudest and, as all the gossip claimed, fucked the most. But that was as a young lord without a care in the world. Surely a new king who’d fought a bloody war would leave those boyish vices behind. Cersei told Jaime as much.

“Oh, certainly,” Jaime sneered. “Certainly it was only his grief upon discovering the Stark girl had died that sent him into Flea Bottom to seek the solace of barmaids and their wares.”

 _The Stark girl_. Cersei had only known of Lyanna Stark in passing. The match of maid of Winterfell to a lord so far south as the Stormlands had caused its fair share of talk. Cersei hadn’t paid it much mind. Her focus had always remained on King’s Landing. Even after Rhaegar had married Elia Martell, Lord Tywin had not given up his hope for a match. The Dornishwoman had been notoriously sickly and Lord Tywin had brought Cersei to King’s Landing and given her rooms in the Tower of the Hand to monitor every cough and moment of frailty and count it as a step closer towards her goal. She had felt a bit like a crow, watching and waiting, and yet when the time came, when Elia had nearly died birthing a son and all the castle gossip swore she would not survive a third child, Rhaegar had not looked towards Cersei. His gaze had gone to _that Stark girl_ and a dynasty had come to ruins.

Yet a new one was rising with Cersei at its center and whatever grief Robert had would have no place in it. Of that, she would be sure. Lyanna Stark had taken Rhaegar from her and that would be quite enough.

She dismissed Jaime’s concerns entirely. “What came before will not be what comes after. If he’s to prove himself a king, he must be kingly. That old goat Arryn will see to that. And if he’s to prove himself worthy of Lannister support, he’ll treat me as a queen. Our father will see to that. You as well, yes?”

Jaime looked insulted to be asked. Perhaps that was why he shot back, “I can’t decide whether you’re being overly naïve or overly arrogant. But we are Lannisters. Who’s to say we can’t excel at both?”

“Why can’t you be happy? Can’t you see what this means for me? For our family? I will be queen. Lannister blood will sit the Iron Throne.”

“A dream come true !”

Not her exact dream of marrying Prince Rhaegar, but yes, Jaime had the right of it – marrying a king could only be grander than her original hopes. The girl who’d drawn pictures of a husband and wife flying together on dragon’s wings was still inside her. She’d only gained new pictures to create. They’d be beautiful, certainly, though the form they would take was unclear to her and becoming less so the more Jaime spoke. 

“It is Father’s dream,” Cersei answered. “And there isn’t a high born maid in Westeros that doesn’t wish to be in my position.”

“Do not pity them, sweet sister. I’m sure Robert will give them ample opportunities to assume all sorts of positions.”

Why must he be so obstinate? Oh, Cersei knew why Jaime disliked Robert but why could he not be happy for her? Finally, she said it. “You only say these things out of jealousy.”

“That makes them no less true.”

She should chide him further but that he had so readily conceded the source of his irritation - no matter how obvious it had already been - only warmed Cersei to him. She would make her own concessions. 

“Don’t you see? This will be the best for us as well. I will be queen and you are Kingsguard. Father can’t send me back to the Rock and he can’t take that cloak from your back. We will always be together.”

“I’ll be right by your side as another man claims you as his own. I can see why you’d think that a dream for me.”

“But what else could you hope for?”

The gods both bless and damn him, Jaime had hoped for more. Cersei could see it in his eyes and the quivering of his lower lip as he sought to give voice to his dream. “We’ve wealth enough, Cersei. Father would not miss whole stacks of dragons if we took them and bought passage to Essos.”

“Essos? Have you gone as mad as Aerys?”

His next words hardly dissuaded her. “Think of it! We could go to the Free Cities and leave all of this behind. No duty to the Rock or Robert, only each other. Every day spent free. I hear they let women train to be bravos. Remember, Cersei, how you longed to wear breeches and learn to wield a sword? You’d have your sword in the days and at night, I could peel those breeches from you…”

“Father would never allow it.” Cersei had to say it sharply, to remind herself as much as Jaime. The picture he painted was as lovely as any as she had imagined. Lovelier, for Cersei had never allowed herself to dream of anything so bold. She’d always known she could never have it. “Father would hunt us down and drag us back. He’d never stand for us shaming our house. The dishonor of breaking your vows –”

“Bit late for that.”

“The dishonor of breaking a betrothal, a betrothal to a king no less! The dishonor of walking away from such power!”

“The dishonor of butchering children and offering their bloody corpses as presents,” Jaime muttered. “Oh, I forget myself. That is the action of a proud, noble man.”

There’d been rumors of what had happened to the Targaryen children and Lord Tywin’s role in it, even at the Rock. Cersei had quieted them the best she could, more for her sake than her father’s. Whatever actions he had taken, he had taken them purely out of necessity. That was the reason she’d given herself. Tywin had dwelled on it already; nothing was served by her dwelling any further.

Convincing Jaime might be a worthy reason though. “It is the action of a proud man. What do you think his actions would be if that man’s children made selfish fools of themselves and their family by running away?”

Jaime grew distant then, at last contemplating the consequences of his ridiculous dreams. It hurt him, just as it hurt Cersei, but she had the advantage of years spent being inured to disappointment by all the expectations placed on her by virtue of her sex. As a boy, Jaime could have aspired to whatever he wished and had. As a girl, Cersei had placed so much faith in a royal marriage because that was the most she could ever aspire to. She’d always known the course of her future, had never had a need of anyone’s worthless guesses; she’d only doubted the details of what was along the path. If only she could steer Jaime as clearly.

“This is how it was meant to be, Jaime. If I married any other man, he’d take me away to his castle and apart from you. If you were not in the Kingsguard, Father would find you an empty headed little maid and bury you under the duties of ruling the Rock. You never wanted that. Remember why you were so eager to don that cloak? You wanted to be near me.”

“I wanted to be a great knight,” he said softy. “I wanted to be Arthur Dayne. And now no one could say our names in the same breath without choking.”

“You’ll be greater than Arthur Dayne. You’ll have someone more worthy to watch over than Aerys. Someone more pleasant to watch, I’d wager.”

Cersei withdrew from him, but only to let Jaime look. She took his hands again, this time to guide them to her hips. Jaime did not need the instruction. The dour grimace upon his face began shifting into a small smile. The spark in his eyes - that glow of love and longing he gave only to her - was back. She’d made him understand.

And he was determined to show that understanding. Jaime hoisted her by her waist and twirled her around to he could lay her down on the table behind them. “If Robert’s going to have his barmaids, this is only fair,” he said.

Fair, yes. Smart? Not in the least. This was more dangerous than all the talk that came before it and foolish for more reasons than Cersei could count. But it was right. She curled a leg around Jaime and urged him closer. The grand destiny Lord Tywin had promised her all those years ago would be hers at last and Jaime would be there for it.

At that moment, she wouldn’t have had it any other way.


	3. Six-and-ten

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warning for rape.

_“Six-and-ten for him, and three for you.”_

Cersei had not bled for Robert on the night of their wedding. Jaime had had that honor well ahead of him. She’d had an excuse ready, the same excuse of horseback riding all highborn maids liked to make, but Robert had been too drunk to notice and too lost in his pitiful delusions to care.

She did bleed for him on another night. He entered her chambers well after she’d gone to sleep. Cersei woke to him standing over her, pawing at her blankets and muttering a coarse tavern song laden with innuendo under his breath. He reeked of wine and other women yet he clearly had not had his fill of either. He took a long drought from the wineskin he’d brought with him and pulled her blankets off her bed entirely. Cersei closed her eyes to the rest.

The bed creaked when he climbed atop her. Robert had been a sweet sight when they’d married. Tall, handsome and muscled, he’d looked every bit the powerful king when they had said their vows. Not once had Cersei considered the possibility that his strength would be used against her. She’d discovered her folly soon enough when she’d made the mistake of thinking she could chastise him for uttering another women’s name - _that girl’s name_ \- by withholding her affections. Robert Baratheon did not like having things withheld from him. What Robert wanted, Robert made sure to get.

This was her duty. To lie silent and spread her legs as if she was a whore. She’d learned tricks like the whores used too. She knew how to use her hands or, on the occasions when tugging on his cock wasn’t enough to satisfy Robert, her mouth to please him. There were other occasions though when these tricks would fail her. Occasions on which Robert wanted the cunt he’d claimed as his own on their wedding day.

And what Robert wanted…

He was quick to claim his rights. He put his hand between her thighs but it was only to push them apart. His weight settled over her, all those muscles becoming a cage from which she had no way to free herself. In the dark, she let her thoughts go back to the lions she and Jaime had seen as children. They’d been caged as well but not broken. They’d paced their confines with grace and a ferocity that they’d let out in roars that had sent onlookers scurrying from the cage. It had been as if the bars were a protection for all those outside, not a prison for the beasts inside.

_I am a lioness._ She hadn’t been afraid like the others. Cersei had approached the cage, closer than even Jaime would come. Her twin hadn’t believed she could reach out to the lions. He hadn’t dared such a thing. But she had. She’d been brave. She’d looked into the face of those beasts, of their fearsome power, and she’d touched them. In turn, they hadn’t roared. They hadn’t bared their teeth. They’d stared as she had stared, until Jaime had called her away.

_I am a lioness_ , she thought again. And again and again as Robert grunted and thrust above her. Pain burned bright inside her but she kept her eyes and lips closed. Cersei did not know what had happened to those lions. Most likely, they’d been kept in those cages to be displayed by the people who’d been fool enough to think they could be masters of such noble creatures. But maybe, just maybe, they’d escaped, the chains that sealed their cages torn off by tooth or claw. Those lions were running free, ruling over whatever woods they roamed and answering every challenge with a bellowing roar.

She’d see them again some day.

***

Cersei had been sore the morning after. She’d had the maids draw her bath hot, the better to soothe her battered body, and then ordered them gone, the better to scrub off the streaks of blood that had crusted between her legs without anyone’s prying eyes upon her. She’d cursed Robert thoroughly at every wince elicited by the simple touch of a washcloth to skin.

But what she would give to see blood there now.

Her moonblood usually came when the moon shrunk to a tiny sliver in the sky. It had disappeared and come back to over half without a single drop of red. Cersei had given up prayer after her mother had died and all her desperate pleas had gone unanswered but she found herself walking to the sept each day to beg that her courses would come. It was a farce, truly, praying to gods she knew didn’t listen and unsure of which one to pray to. Not the Mother - her gifts were the last thing Cersei wished for. The Maiden might have understood her fear. There was gossip around the Red Keep about her new found piety, but Cersei did not care. She preferred her maids spoke of that rather than the suspicious nature of the dirtied rags and smallclothes she’d manufactured.

When the moon hung full in the sky and her blood had yet to flow, she broke her silence to Jaime. Cersei never considered telling anyone else. He would understand. He would help her. He would hold her close and stroke her hair while she sobbed into his shoulder and choked out the news that any other high born woman would have gladly shouted from the castle walls. Her Jaime, her sweet, beautiful Jaime, did all this and more.

“No one suspects?” he whispered gently.

Cersei shook her head and explained the ludicrous lengths to which she’d gone to conceal her secret. “I pricked my finger and wiped it across my smallclothes but it wasn’t enough. So I sneaked down to the kitchens in one of my maid’s clothes and gathered a bit of blood from a butchering.”

“Gods, Cersei, you should have told me sooner! I would have gone for you. If you’d been caught…”

“I wasn’t. But I fear I will be soon if something isn’t done.” She’d dreamt last night of that very thing. The whole court had gathered in the throne room to watch as Robert once again spread her legs. They’d cheered as he nearly cleaved her in two reaching into her to rip out a bloody, screeching mass. Cersei had woken sweating and nauseous and so desperate, she’d taken fist to stomach in a feeble attempt to put an end to it.

“What can be done?”

Cersei hesitated to say. Cynicism was growing in him, had taken seed when he’d killed Aerys, but it hadn’t yet bloomed fully. What was obvious to her remained hidden to him. Of course, it was easy for him. He’d had spent his youth with swords and knights. He hadn’t cared to learn the darker, desperate ways of women because Cersei was the only woman he cared anything about. The bawdy stories of his fellow nights held no interest for him. The charms of other women less so. If he was to learn, she must teach him.

Cersei steeled her face as tightly as she could. “There are herbs a woman can take. They’ll make her bleed. They’ll cleanse her.”

His eyes widened for but a moment, then he simply nodded. “Will they make you ill?”

“Perhaps. But that would be a small price to pay.”

“And you’ve no desire to bear his child?” That was sole time he questioned her.

Had Jaime been their father, she would have heard a great deal more. He’d be lecturing her on how it was her duty. On how this was a blessing that would cement Lannister power and she should go Maester Pycelle straight away so that he could verify her worth as a woman. Jaime did not even demand an explanation, only instruction on a course of action. 

Not that Cersei could give him an explanation. A word from her on the nature of Robert’s claiming of his rights or a glimpse of the bruises he left behind and Jaime would have his sword from his sheathe before she could protest. Robert would simply be another dead king to Jaime, one he mourned less than Aerys. But there’d be no pardon for Jaime this time and while she held no doubts that Robert could not stand against her twin, she feared what harm might be done before he finally fell.

So what was there to say? That Robert’s body holding her down was enough of a cage and she did not need for her own body to become one as well? That the thought of carrying and nurturing a babe within her only to have it become its father’s child once it was pulled out of her horrified her? That she feared looking upon her son’s face and seeing only a reminder of the humiliation that created him?

“No, I don’t want his child, not yet,” she said instead. “It’s too soon. Gods, there are rumors in every tavern in Flea Bottom about bastards being born to those barmaids you spoke of. You had the right of it.”

Jaime acknowledged her admission with a sneer of disgust for the man who’d proven him correct. He did not need a reason beyond the insult being done to her and even that had likely been unneeded. With nothing left to discuss, he asked, “How can you get these herbs?”

“I don’t think I can. Going to the kitchens was treacherous enough. If I were to make inquiries about these herbs…”

Jaime didn‘t hesitate. “How can I get these herbs?”

Cersei had notions, most of them centered around the sort of taverns Robert visited and the alleyways around them. High born women were at the mercy of a maester or their friends to acquire these goods, not so for those of lesser birth. No one cared about their breeding or lack thereof. A small advantage in their miserable little lives. For a bit of coin, they’d share their secrets though and for a bit more, would keep their silence. Lannisters had plenty of coin.

They had slightly less the next night when Jaime came to her in her quarters. In return, he produced a small satchel. He tossed it to Cersei as if it contained nothing more than sweets. Which, from a certain perspective, Cersei supposed that was what they were. Their taste though was more bitter than anything she’d ever tasted. She brewed them into a tea that stained the cup a dark brown and filled her chambers with an acrid scent. Cersei tried to imagine how despairing the first woman who had discovered this blend must have been. She only choked it down through sheer force of will. Jaime watched with worry and tried to soothe her by repeating what the seller of the herbs had told him. These herbs were foul to take but kinder and quicker in carrying out their effects than others of their ilk. That was Jaime, protecting her in whatever ways he could. 

There was nothing to be done with the sharp pangs that ran through her when the herbs began working. The end was not unlike the beginning in that regard. It was far better though in that Jaime was there, fretting over every grimace of pain and not sparing a thought for anything but her. Hours he spent with her, only wanting to leave when the bleeding began in earnest and he feared for her health.

But no maester could attend to her for this. Whatever help Jaime found would only damn her. He understood this, hated Robert a bit more for it and held her close. As the woman had promised Jaime, it was over quickly. There was blood, but nothing Cersei could not wash away. Pain lingered in her sides but Jaime’s hands working the muscles of her back made it fade. 

He kissed the back of her neck and asked, “How do you feel?”

There was only one word to describe it. 

_Free._

**Author's Note:**

> I know prophecy is Big Thing in asoiaf with many of them coming eerily true. Even MMD's prophecy to Dany, which came across as a fancy way to tell her 'when pigs fly', is taken seriously and aspects of it seemed to come true in ADWD. But I wondered about Maggy's prophecy. It's implied that Cersei had an active role in Melara's death but why would Cersei kill her friend? To shut her up about the prophecy is the most common answer. But wouldn't that mean the only reason the prophecy about Melara's death came true at all is because the prophecies were made in the first place? Maggy was right because Cersei made her right. I'll give Maggy the marrying the king instead of the prince part but how much of the rest was the (unintentional and unknowing) result of Cersei's choices? As Marwyn said, prophecy is like a treacherous woman. I love my girl Cersei, but I've got to admit, sometimes she really fits that bill.


End file.
